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Custom Marketing & Lead SolutionsTue, 20 Mar 2018 01:13:19 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.49 Ways to Make a Resume Employers Will Hate [Infographic]https://www.jumpartmedia.com/9-ways-to-make-a-resume-employers-will-hate-infographic/
https://www.jumpartmedia.com/9-ways-to-make-a-resume-employers-will-hate-infographic/#respondTue, 20 Mar 2018 01:13:16 +0000https://www.jumpartmedia.com/9-ways-to-make-a-resume-employers-will-hate-infographic/Crafting a standout resume is a lot of work.
Not only do you have to write the darn thing, but you also have to check (and double-check) for typos, even out your margins, make sure you're not repeating the same action verb 10 times ... the list goes on.
In other words, knowing what makes a good resume also means knowing what makes a bad one. And while there are a lot of little things you'll want to check before sending your "curriculum vitae" (CV) to a recruiter, some are more important than others.
Download our 10 free marketing resume templates here. In the name of prioritization, check out the infographic below from StandoutCV for a list of nine resume mistakes you definitely don't want to make the next time you apply to an open position. Then, see a brief list of advice to keep bookmarked when you find your dream job.

Perhaps this infographic made you cringe at a mistake you made in a past resume. Everyone needs another chance -- so, here's a quick summary ..

Not only do you have to write the darn thing, but you also have to check (and double-check) for typos, even out your margins, make sure you're not repeating the same action verb 10 times … the list goes on.

In the name of prioritization,check out the infographic below from StandoutCV for a list of nine resume mistakes you definitely don't want to make the next time you apply to an open position. Then, see a brief list of advice to keep bookmarked when you find your dream job.

Perhaps this infographic made you cringe at a mistake you made in a past resume. Everyone needs another chance — so, here's a quick summary of things to keep in mind when making (or remaking) your CV:

Professional email address: Your old AOL screen name won't cut it in the job world. Stick to your first and/or last name.

Actionable verbs: Don't just say you're a "self-starter" — explain what you did to earn that title.

Years of experience: "Proficient" needs a number value. How long have you done these things?

One to two pages: Recruiters sift through a lot of resumes every day. Make yours as concise as possible.

Employment consistency: Did you take a year off? What'd you do to stay productive?

Error-free: "Attention to detail" is a bullet point on so many job listings today. Show you care with a resume that is clean of typos.

Balance and neatness:Sans serif fonts and bulleted lists make your resume easy to read. (Hint: This blog post does both of those things!)

]]>https://www.jumpartmedia.com/9-ways-to-make-a-resume-employers-will-hate-infographic/feed/0How to Set, Get, and Delete WordPress Cookies (like a Pro)https://www.jumpartmedia.com/how-to-set-get-and-delete-wordpress-cookies-like-a-pro/
https://www.jumpartmedia.com/how-to-set-get-and-delete-wordpress-cookies-like-a-pro/#respondMon, 19 Mar 2018 11:55:28 +0000https://www.jumpartmedia.com/how-to-set-get-and-delete-wordpress-cookies-like-a-pro/Do you want to learn how to use cookies on your WordPress site? Cookies are a useful tool to store temporary information in user’s browser and then use this information to enhance user experience through personalization and behavioral targeting. In this ultimate guide, we will show you how to set, get, and delete WordPress cookies like a pro.

Note: This is an advanced tutorial. It requires you to have proficient understanding of HTML, CSS, WordPress site, and PHP.
What Are Cookies? Cookies are plain text files that are created and stored in users browser when they visit a website. Cookies are used to add different features on a website.
Following are some of the common usage of cookies on various websites.
Store and manage user’s login information Store temporary session information during a users visit Ecommerce stores use cookies to remember cart items during a user’s visit Track user activity on a site to offer personalized user experience and more As you can see, cookies ar..

]]>Do you want to learn how to use cookies on your WordPress site? Cookies are a useful tool to store temporary information in user’s browser and then use this information to enhance user experience through personalization and behavioral targeting. In this ultimate guide, we will show you how to set, get, and delete WordPress cookies like a pro.

Note: This is an advanced tutorial. It requires you to have proficient understanding of HTML, CSS, WordPress site, and PHP.

What Are Cookies?

Cookies are plain text files that are created and stored in users browser when they visit a website. Cookies are used to add different features on a website.

Following are some of the common usage of cookies on various websites.

Store and manage user’s login information

Store temporary session information during a users visit

Ecommerce stores use cookies to remember cart items during a user’s visit

Track user activity on a site to offer personalized user experience

and more

As you can see, cookies are highly useful tool for website owners, but they can also be a bit invasive. Recent trends in email marketing, growth hacking, and online marketing as a whole allow websites to set cookies that act as a beacon and can be used to store and even share user activity across websites.

This is why European Union enacted the EU Cookie Law, which requires website owners to declare that they use cookies to store information.

How Cookies are Used in a Typical WordPress Website

By default, WordPress uses cookies to manage logged-in user sessions and authentication. It also uses cookies to remember a user’s name and email address if they fill out a comment form.

However, many WordPress plugins on your website may also set their own cookies. For example, OptinMonster allows you to show different email optin forms to new vs returning visitors, and it does that by using cookies.

If you are using third party services on your website like Google Analytics or Google AdSense, then they may also set cookies on your website.

You can view all website cookies in your browser’s settings. For example, in Google Chrome you need to go to settings and search for ‘content settings’.

Under content settings, you will need to click on ‘Cookies’ to open the cookies settings page.

Next, you need to click on the ‘All cookies and site data’ option.

On the next page, you will see a list of all cookies and site data stored on your browser by all websites you visited.

You can type a website address in the search box, and it will show you the data stored by that website.

Clicking on a single item will show you more details about individual cookies and their contents.

How to Set a Cookie in WordPress

To follow this tutorial, you will need to add code to your theme’s functions.php file or a site-specific plugin. If you haven’t done this before, then please take a look at our guide on how to copy and paste code snippets in WordPress.

First we will use the setcookie() function in PHP. This function accepts the following parameters.

Cookie name

Cookie value

Expire (Optional: sets a time period after which cookie expires)

Path (Optional, by default it will use the site’s root)

Domain (Optional, by default uses your website’s domain)

Secure (Optional, If true then only transfers cookie data via HTTPS)

httponly (Optional, when set true the cookie is only accessible via HTTP and cannot be used by scripts)

Now let’s add a code snippet to your WordPress site. This code stores the exact timestamp when a user visited your website in a cookie.

You can now visit your website and then check your browser cookies. You will find a cookie with the name wpb_visit_time.

How to Get a Cookie and Use it in WordPress

Now that we have created this cookie that’s stored in user’s browser for 1 year, let’s take a look at how can we use this information on our website.

If you know the name of a cookie, then you can easily call it anywhere in PHP using the $_COOKIE[] variable. Let’s add some code that not only sets the cookie but also uses it to do something on your website.

We have commented the code to show you what each part does. This code uses the information stored in the cookie and outputs it using the shortcode. You can now add shortcode [greet_me] anywhere on your website, and it will show when a user last visited.

Feel free to modify the code to make it more useful for your website. For example, you can show recent posts to returning users and popular posts to new users.

Deleting a Cookie in WordPress

So far we have learned how to set a cookie and use it later in your website. Now let’s take a look at how to delete a cookie.

To delete a cookie, you need to add the following line to your code.

unset($_COOKIE['wpb_visit_time']);

Don’t forget to replace wpb_visit_time with the name of the cookie you are trying to delete.

Let’s put this code in some context using the same sample code we used above. This time we will delete a cookie and set it again with new information.

]]>https://www.jumpartmedia.com/how-to-set-get-and-delete-wordpress-cookies-like-a-pro/feed/0The Best of B2B Marketing Content: 10 Exampleshttps://www.jumpartmedia.com/the-best-of-b2b-marketing-content-10-examples/
https://www.jumpartmedia.com/the-best-of-b2b-marketing-content-10-examples/#respondMon, 19 Mar 2018 01:11:15 +0000https://www.jumpartmedia.com/the-best-of-b2b-marketing-content-10-examples/Here at HubSpot, some of the most awe-inspiring moments take place when we get to take new products and features for a test drive. We transform, if it's even imaginable, into even bigger geeks than we normally are, squealing with the excitement typically reserved for iPhone launches and new seasons of Netflix series.
But alas -- this glee is caused by software we use every day at work, and will eventually get to share with other marketers.
Many B2B marketers have seen B2C content at least once and asked, "Why do they get to have all the fun?" But the moments like the one we described above are the ones that remind us: B2B companies are just as passionate about their products as B2C companies are. And for every B2B product, there are even more B2B users out there looking for information, inspiration, and knowledge to provide them with solutions.
The point? No marketing, including content, is uninteresting if you look at it certain ways.

]]>Here at HubSpot, some of the most awe-inspiring moments take place when we get to take new products and features for a test drive. We transform, if it's even imaginable, into even bigger geeks than we normally are, squealing with the excitement typically reserved for iPhone launches and new seasons of Netflix series.

But alas — this glee is caused by software we use every day at work, and will eventually get to share with other marketers.

Many B2B marketers have seen B2C content at least once and asked, "Why do they get to have all the fun?" But the moments like the one we described above are the ones that remind us: B2B companies are just as passionate about their products as B2C companies are. And for every B2B product, there are even more B2B users out there looking for information, inspiration, and knowledge to provide them with solutions.

The point? No marketing, including content, is uninteresting if you look at it certain ways.

Done right, B2B content marketing can certainly match — and sometimes, maybe even rival — the creativity and appeal of the best B2C ones. And we want to recognize the brands that are breaking that mold and creating great content that grows fervent, dedicated audiences.

Below, you'll find a few of our favorites, all with their own B2B marketing strategies that you can take with you.

10 Exceptional B2B Content Marketing Examples

1. CB Insights: Newsletter

What It Does Well

There are two things I love about the CB Insights newsletter. First, it's surprisingly funny (the subject lines alone make it worth it). Second, you learn a lot just by reading the newsletter, no need to click through a bunch of links.”

We love how this newsletter illustrates the willingness of CB Insights to not take itself too seriously. Yes, it shares some of the finest insights on technology, venture capital (VC), and emerging businesses, but it does so with fun images that ultimately relate back to the subject — e.g., the above photo of Oprah that’s been adapted as a meme, since, well, that was the topic of the newsletter.

But the messaging remains relevant, even among the hint of silliness. After all, CB Insights designs technology for people in the VC space, so it’s tasked with creating content that will appeal to a broad audience: customers, prospective customers, tech enthusiasts, and investors. And so, under such subject lines as “so sad: tough to have a VC dad,” it includes relevant data. Yes, gifs are hilarious — but in some contexts, they’re also worth $147 million.

Takeaway for Marketers: Remember Your Buyer's Goals

So, while it’s great to think outside of the box, use clever subject lines, or even write every email with an overarching humorous tone — keep it relevant and include the information that the people reading it signed up to receive in the first place. Then, keep it human.

2. Mattermark: Raise the Bar

What It Does Well

Raise the Bar rounds up the best stories about a variety of different industries, giving me a great snapshot of trends to watch and news stories to follow without having to search for them myself."

One of the best things about well-curated content — especially the kind that pertains to your line of work — is that it eliminates a lot of work. Keeping up with news and trends is never easy when you’ve already got a full plate, so when someone else is able to hand-pick the things you need to know, it can feel like you’ve struck gold.

That’s what Raise the Bar does, by compiling a “daily digest of timely, must-read posts on sales, marketing and growth engineering.” And, that was the intent all along. In a 2016 blog post announcing the launch of the newsletter, Mattermark’s Co-founder and CEO, Danielle Morrill, wrote, “We’re turning our focus toward sifting through the mountains of content out there around sales, marketing, and growth to help the community of DOERS who grow companies.”

Takeaway for Marketers: Educate Your Buyers

Think about the problems that your product or service already aims to solve for customers. Then, turn that into relevant content that’s going to both save time for and inform your audience — and make it easy for them to access it.

3. MYOB: Tax Time

What It Does Well

MYOB, a provider of business management solutions in Australia and New Zealand, helps companies manage their finances, in part by connecting them with bookkeepers and financial services professionals. It has two main buyer personas:

Small businesses that are just learning the ropes

More established companies that need greater insight into all facets of their operations.

Each audience has its own set of concerns and corresponding hub of information on MYOB.com — and MYOB has built a B2B content marketing strategy for each one that shows how much it understands its customers.

MYOB recognizes that many businesses are figuring out accounting and financial decisions as they grow, so it’s created content that positions the brand as a go-to resource to help those businesses navigate each stage of their development. The Tax Time center, for example, is angled to fit the needs of both customer groups, providing tips for those just starting out, and guides for breaking through new stages of development.

Takeaway for Marketers: Grow With Your Buyers

When you begin to brainstorm and map out ideas for content, ask yourself, “Do I really understand my audience?” If you have any doubts as to how the idea will benefit or be useful to your audience, the answer might be “no” — and that’s okay. Like everything else, audiences (and people) evolve, so it’s okay to go back to the drawing board in instances like these for a refresh.

4. Unbounce: Page Fights (R.I.P.)

What It Does Well

If you’ve ever seen a growth marketer on the heels of a successful optimization experiment, you know that her energy is electric. Unbounce, a landing page software company based in Vancouver, understands that excitement and decided to leverage it to create an engaging microsite, Page Fights, in collaboration with optimization company Conversion XL.

The project came to a close after one year, but during its existence, Page Fights contained live streams of marketing optimization expert panels who critiqued landing pages in real time. It was content that expanded far beyond the written word — and that was one thing that made it so great.

Sure, Unbounce has a successful blog, but it saw Page Fights as an opportunity to expand beyond that copy. It knew that the web — especially within marketing and web design — was becoming increasingly crowded with content. To address that, it diversified the format of its expertise, to keep its audience engaged and learning.

Takeaway for Marketers: Diversify Your Channels

The internet is only going to become more crowded. And as the human attention span dwindles, that makes it even more important to create content that engages and maintains your audience’s attention.

So while we don’t recommend abandoning blogs completely — after all, written content is still vital to SEO — we do emphasize the importance of diversifying content formats. Marketers who incorporate video into their content strategies, for example, have seen 49% faster revenue growth than those who don’t. And remember that tip to “keep it human” we mentioned earlier? That’s a great thing about live video in particular — it can help portray brands (and their people) as candid and genuine.

5. Deloitte Insights

What It Does Well

Deloitte is a professional services company specializing in consulting, tech, auditing, and more. It works with a massive cross-section of industries, from government agencies to life sciences — and that broad range of knowledge is a major selling point. That’s why creating informed, useful content for individual, specialized audiences is core to its marketing strategy.

But Deloitte has also used that wealth of knowledge to position itself as a resource for those who want to know what it knows. So, among its specialized hubs are educational content centers, including Deloitte Insights (formerly branded Deloitte University Press).

Much like some of the other remarkable B2B content we’ve come across, it curates not only different pieces of highly helpful content — but also a variety of content formats. From blog posts, to webcasts, to podcasts, Deloitte Insights has a bit of everything for those who want to learn about its specialties and the industries it works with.

Takeaway for Marketers: Separate Your Buyer Personas

Creating a content strategy to please a wide-scale audience like Deloitte’s is challenging. It can quickly become unfocused. But if your company has a number of specialties, creating content microsites for each of them is one way to keep that information organized, discoverable, and easy to navigate.

Plus, it can never hurt to establish your brand as a go-to resource. So, as you create these content hubs, consider adding a “knowledge center” among them that’s dedicated to teaching your audience the valuable things it wants to learn.

6. First Round Magazines

What It Does Well

Here’s another example of a brand that does a great job of leveraging different categories of knowledge. First Round, an early-stage VC company, recognized the knowledge among entrepreneurs and leaders that wasn’t being shared — knowledge that could be highly beneficial to their peers — and created the First Round Review as a place for it to be shared. It serves, reads the manifesto, to liberate the ideas and expertise that are “trapped in other people's heads.”

But liberating that much-untapped knowledge can lead to the same problem we alluded to above — an unfocused mass of content that makes it difficult to discover exactly what you’re looking for. That’s why First Round organized the Review into a collection of nine online magazines, each specializing in a different aspect of building a business.

Takeaway for Marketers: Work With Thought Leaders

If you’ve ever wondered how to leverage the wealth of knowledge outside of your organization — and inside your professional network — here’s a great example.

Don’t be afraid to reach out to the entrepreneurs and leaders you’ve met, or simply just admire, to figure out how they can work with you to create content with teachable experiences that your audience will value. Sharing useful, relatable first-hand accounts conveys empathy, which helps to invoke trust among readers.

7. NextView Ventures: Better Everyday

What It Does Well

We absolutely love stumbling across B2B companies with an active presence on Medium. A great example is VC firm NextView Ventures' Better Everyday, a Medium publication that focuses on “stories, analyses & resources to help seed-stage founders redesign the everyday.”

But why would NextView want to create an entirely separate blog that isn’t even on its website? Well, it’s an exercise in creating off-site content: the material you own but doesn’t live on your website. When executed correctly, it can give publishers a huge boost in discoverability, variety, and quality, especially when making use of a highly popular platform like Medium.

Because Better Everyday isn’t attached to the company’s main URL, it provides an opportunity for NextView to experiment with different tones, voices, and stories — all from a variety of experts that might already be using Medium to discover and contribute unique content. Plus, with Medium’s built-in ability for people to recommend, highlight, and search internally for relevant content, it makes the work published there that much more shareable.

Takeaway for Marketers: Publish Off-Domain Content

Take advantage of the availability of off-site content platforms. As my colleague, Sam Mallikarjunan, writes in “Why Medium Works,” it can take up to six months of consistent publishing on your company’s blog before it gains significant traction. (And we’re not discouraging that — stick with it, and find ways to supplement those efforts.) But off-site content diversifies your audience by engaging readers who might not have otherwise found your website.

Medium, for example, connects your content with the people most likely to read it. Plus, you’re creating a publication on a platform that comes with a built-in audience of at least 6.3 million users.

What It Does Well

At risk of sounding like a broken record, we can’t emphasize enough the importance of B2B brands maintaining a human element. That’s why we like it when companies use social media channels to give audiences a “look inside” at the people who make the great products and services they love.

Wistia, a video hosting platform, does that particularly well by sharing visual content on Instagram that lifts the curtain on its people — and dogs. It not only aligns with its brand — after all, the company does provide technology to businesses that want hosting solutions for their visual content — but it’s also just smart. Among its other advantages, visual content can help boost a viewer’s retention of things like brand information.

Takeaway for Marketers: Incorporate Visual Content

Please, please, please don’t neglect to incorporate visuals into your content strategy. Of course, having a presence on visually-focused channels like Instagram and YouTube is vital — but when it comes to your written content, don’t afraid to use visuals there, as well. After all, articles with an image once every 75-100 words got double the number of social shares than articles with fewer images.

But if you can also create content that aligns with the core of your product or service, that’s also great. As we mentioned before, Wistia creates visual content technology — so it makes sense that it would have unique visual content. Identify what your business does particularly well, and then make the most use of the channel that best aligns with your strengths.

9. Zendesk Engineering

What It Does Well

Yes — more offsite content. This time, it’s from Zendesk, a maker of customer service software that’s done something unique with its Medium publication, Zendesk Engineering.

Zendesk might be an expert in the solutions provided by its product, but behind that product is a chorus of highly skilled experts — the people who build and engineer the software. The company realized that there’s an audience to be tapped that’s seeking insights and expertise on the technical side of the product, so it used that to build an entirely independent content property.

Takeaway for Marketers: Tell Your Brand Story

Dig beneath the surface of the solutions your company provides. You offer solutions — but what is your process? What have you learned that makes you do what you do so well, and how did you get there?

Sure, topics like engineering might be traditionally “unsexy.” But when leveraged and communicated in a storytelling manner, they can make for remarkable content.

10. Hexagon: Annual Report

What It Does Well

For Hexagon, an industrial IT solutions provider, "AR" doesn't just stand for annual report. With that in mind, the company recently "augmented" a presentation to its investors in a creative way.

Hexagon used augmented reality (AR) to spruce up their written company report, giving investors a more interactive experience when learning the latest updates on the company. How does it work? A mobile app, based on technology from Samsung and zSpace, displays a virtual demonstration of a product when readers hold their mobile device over a "trigger image" of that product within the report.

Takeaway for Marketers: Challenge Your Buyers

It's easy to feel limited by your medium as you create content — especially for a business audience who you've all agreed is comfortable with that medium.

But in order for content to convert readers and incite growth, it needs to occasionally disrupt its audience's point of view. A company doesn't work for its content; content works for its company. If you need to say something that a blog alone can't, the business demands that you make it work — whether that means starting a YouTube channel or seeing how you can integrate an AR tool into your next ebook.

And the List Goes On

We’re optimistic that the digital realm is full of strong B2B content marketing efforts — and, we want to hear about them. But even more than that, we want to hear how these examples inspire you. As they show, there's a world of content opportunities out there, just waiting for creative B2B marketers to take on.

]]>https://www.jumpartmedia.com/the-best-of-b2b-marketing-content-10-examples/feed/0Does Buying Instagram Followers Work?https://www.jumpartmedia.com/does-buying-instagram-followers-work/
https://www.jumpartmedia.com/does-buying-instagram-followers-work/#respondSun, 18 Mar 2018 01:10:43 +0000https://www.jumpartmedia.com/does-buying-instagram-followers-work/You might know your Instagram content is good, but imagine how much better it will seem if it looks like 10,000 people agree.
Whether you’re trying to become a social media celebrity or simply looking to spread brand awareness on Instagram, it can seem tempting to pay for your first couple thousand followers.
There are plenty of services available that allow you to buy 1,000 followers for the price of a small Starbucks latte. But of course, if it really was that cheap and easy, everyone would be doing it. So what’s the catch? Is buying Instagram followers legal and safe for your business? Is it a worthwhile investment?
Here, we’ve gone ahead and covered all the questions you might have about buying Instagram followers to give you a better idea of how it actually works. We’ve also explored the pros and cons, so you can decide for yourself if it’s a good move for your brand.
Can you buy Instagram followers? Yes, you can. There are plenty of cheap services available that allow you to ..

]]>You might know your Instagram content is good, but imagine how much better it will seem if it looks like 10,000 people agree.

Whether you’re trying to become a social media celebrity or simply looking to spread brand awareness on Instagram, it can seem tempting to pay for your first couple thousand followers.

There are plenty of services available that allow you to buy 1,000 followers for the price of a small Starbucks latte. But of course, if it really was that cheap and easy, everyone would be doing it. So what’s the catch? Is buying Instagram followers legal and safe for your business? Is it a worthwhile investment?

Here, we’ve gone ahead and covered all the questions you might have about buying Instagram followers to give you a better idea of how it actually works. We’ve also explored the pros and cons, so you can decide for yourself if it’s a good move for your brand.

Can you buy Instagram followers?

Yes, you can. There are plenty of cheap services available that allow you to buy 1,000 followers for as little as $10 USD. But you’re only paying for a number: many of those followers are either bots or inactive accounts, which means they’ll never engage with your posts.

As a quick Google search will reveal, there are many cheap services you can use to buy Instagram followers. For about $6 USD, you can get 500 followers, and for about $10 USD, you can get 1,000 followers.

The vast majority of these purchasable followers, however, are either bots or inactive accounts.

When you buy Instagram followers, you’re paying for a number alone. Engagement is not guaranteed, or even likely.

In addition to buying followers directly, you can also pay services to strategically follow other accounts on your behalf based on your preferences (location, hashtag usage, account type, and gender). Ideally, those followed accounts will then follow you back.

With this option, your followers are more likely to be real people, but engagement is still unlikely. Since you can't even guarantee these accounts will follow you back, it’s a risky investment. Most accounts won’t follow you back, and even if they do, they probably aren’t going to be long-term, loyal, or active followers.

If your priority is simply to have a big follower count, than these services can definitely help you. When your number of organic followers dips, these services even replenish your pool with other followers.

But remember the risks: these followers will probably never like or comment on a post, and if you’re caught with a ton of fake followers, you could ruin your credibility with your real audience.

Think of it this way: would you keep following an account if you saw that most of their “loyal audience” were inactive accounts or bots? I’m guessing not. It could seem deceitful, and lead you to believe the brand couldn’t get authentic followers through content alone.

Should you buy Instagram followers?

It’s not a good idea to buy Instagram followers. The purchased followers are likely bots or inactive accounts, so they won’t engage with your posts. This means your posts won’t show up on Explore Pages, or on your real audience’s newsfeeds. It will also make it hard to measure metrics.

And how helpful, really, are 10,000 followers that don't engage with you? Engagement is key to how Instagram’s algorithm displays posts to users. Without likes or comments, your post probably won’t show up on your audience’s newsfeeds, and it also won’t show up on any Explore Pages.

Having a lot of followers could convince users to follow you organically, but it's not a guarantee.

Users might notice you don’t have a ton of engagement on your posts, which could deter them from following you. If you have 10,000 followers but only four likes per post, it won't take people long to realize something is up.

Without real followers to engage with your content, your posts are essentially hidden from everyone except your unauthentic audience. Plus, your fake followers won’t share your post on any of their channels. And they won’t discuss your brand in real life with friends or family, because, well … they don’t exist in real life (no offense, bots).

It’s also practically impossible to measure how well your target audience is connecting with your brand if a high percentage of that audience isn’t real. How will you measure posts that do well with your real audience if those bots and inactive accounts skew the ratio?

If you don’t know how well your posts are doing or what your real audience thinks, you’ll never convert your Instagram followers into real customers. And isn’t that the point?

Ultimately, if you pay for Instagram followers, you aren’t paying for quality, real-life followers. You’re paying for a blank number. And since Instagram’s algorithm is largely tied to engagement, not followers, buying followers isn’t a long-term solution. In fact, it isn’t really a solution at all.

Take the time, energy, and money that you would’ve dedicated to buying followers, and focus instead on building genuine relationships with a real audience. If your content is engaging and authentic, your loyal followers will spread the word and engage with your brand without needing any bribes.

]]>https://www.jumpartmedia.com/does-buying-instagram-followers-work/feed/0Where Clickbait, Linkbait, and Viral Content Fit in SEO Campaigns – Whiteboard Fridayhttps://www.jumpartmedia.com/where-clickbait-linkbait-and-viral-content-fit-in-seo-campaigns-whiteboard-friday/
https://www.jumpartmedia.com/where-clickbait-linkbait-and-viral-content-fit-in-seo-campaigns-whiteboard-friday/#respondSat, 17 Mar 2018 01:07:23 +0000https://www.jumpartmedia.com/where-clickbait-linkbait-and-viral-content-fit-in-seo-campaigns-whiteboard-friday/Posted by randfish
When is it smart to focus on viral-worthy content and clickbait? When is it not? To see fruitful returns from these kinds of efforts, they need to be done the right way and used in the right places. Rand discusses what kind of content investments make sense for this type of strategy and explains why it works in this week's Whiteboard Friday.

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!
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Video TranscriptionHowdy, Moz fans, and welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. This week we're chatting about when and where you might use clickbait and linkbait and viral-focused content as compared to other types for your SEO-driven campaigns.
There's a lot of savvy sort of folks at the intersection of SEO and content marketing who are practicing things like this right now. We've actually spoken t..

When is it smart to focus on viral-worthy content and clickbait? When is it not? To see fruitful returns from these kinds of efforts, they need to be done the right way and used in the right places. Rand discusses what kind of content investments make sense for this type of strategy and explains why it works in this week's Whiteboard Friday.

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Video Transcription

Howdy, Moz fans, and welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. This week we're chatting about when and where you might use clickbait and linkbait and viral-focused content as compared to other types for your SEO-driven campaigns. There's a lot of savvy sort of folks at the intersection of SEO and content marketing who are practicing things like this right now. We've actually spoken to a few agencies who are specifically focused on this, and they have really solid businesses because many brands understand that these types of investments can produce significant returns. But you have to apply them in the right scenarios and the right spaces. So let's walk through that.

Content investments

Let's say that you're a payroll software provider. Your goal is to increase traffic and conversions, and so you're considering what types of content investments you and your consultant or agency or in-house team might be making on the content front. That could be things like what we've got here:

A. Viral, news-worthy linkbait

I don't necessarily love the word "linkbait," but it still gets a lot of searches, so we're putting it in the title of the Whiteboard Friday because we practice what we preach here, baby. So this might be something like "The Easiest and Hardest Places to Start a Company." Maybe it's countries, maybe it's states, regions, whatever it is. So here are the easy ones and the hard ones and the criteria, and you go out to a bunch of press and you say, "Hey, we produced this list. We think it's worth covering. Here's the criteria we used." You go out to a bunch of companies. You go out to a bunch of state governments. You go out to a bunch of folks who cover this type of space, and hopefully you can get some clickbait, some folks actually clicking, some folks linking. It doesn't necessarily have the most search volume. Folks aren't necessarily interested in, "Oh, what are the hardest places to start a company? Or what are the hardest versus easiest places to start a company?" Maybe you get a few, but it's not necessarily going to drive direct types of traffic that this payroll software provider can convert into customers.

B. Searcher-focused solutions

But there are other options for that, like searcher-focused solutions. So they might say, "Hey, we want to build some content around how to set up payroll as an LLC. That gets a lot of searches. We serve LLCs with our payroll solution. Let's try and target those folks. So here's how to set up payrolls in LLCs in six easy steps. There are the six steps."

C. Competitor comparison content

They see that lots of people are looking for them versus other competitors. So they set up a page that's "QuickBooks versus Gusto versus Square: Which Software is Right for Your Business?" so that they can serve that searcher intent.

D. Conversion-funnel-serving content

So they see that, after searching for their brand name, people also search for, "Can I use this for owner employees, businesses that have owner employees only?" So no employees who are not owners. What's the payroll story with them? How do I get that sorted out? So you create content around this. All of these are types of content that serve SEO, but this one, this viral-focused stuff is the most sort of non-direct. Many times, brands have a tough time getting their head around why they would invest in that. So do SEOs. So let's explain that. If a website's domain authority, their sort of overall link equity at the domain level is already high, they've got lots and lots of links going to lots of places on the site and additional links that don't go to the conversion-focused pages that they're specifically trying to rank for, for focused keyword targets isn't really required, then really B, C, and D are where you should spend your time and energy. A is not a great investment. It's not solving the problem you want to solve. If the campaign needs…

More raw brand awareness – People knowing who the company is, they haven't heard of them before. You're trying to build that first touch or that second touch so that people in the space know who you are.

Additional visitors for re-targeting – You're trying to get additional visitors who might fit into your target audience so that you can re-target and remarket to them, reach them again;

You have a need for more overall links really to anywhere on the domain – Just to boost your authority, to boost your link equity so that you can rank for more stuff…

Then A, that viral-focused content makes a ton of sense, and it is a true SEO investment. Even though it doesn't necessarily map very well to conversions directly, it's an indirect path to great potential SEO success.

Why this works:

Why does this work? Why is it that if I create a piece of viral content on my site that earns a lot of links and attention and awareness, the other pieces of content on my site will suddenly have a better opportunity to rank? That's a function of how Google operates fundamentally, well, Google and people.

So, from Google's perspective, it works because in the case where Google sees DomainX.com, which has lots of pages earning many, many different links from all around the web, and DomainY.com, which may be equally relevant to the search query and maybe has just as good content but has few links pointing to it and those links, maybe the same number of links are pointing to the specific pages targeting a specific keyword, but overall across the domain, X is just much, much greater than Y. Google interprets that as more links spread across the content on X makes the search engine believe that X is more authoritative and potentially even more relevant than Y is. This content has been referenced more in more different ways from more places, therefore its relevance and authority are perceived as higher. If Y can go ahead and make a viral content investment that draws in lots and lots of new links, it can potentially compete much better against X.

This is true for people and human beings too. If you're getting lots and lots of visitors all over Domain X, but very few on Domain Y, even if they're going in relatively similar proportion to the product-focused pages, the fact that X is so much better known by such a broader audience means that conversions are likely to be better. People know them, they trust them, they've heard of them before, therefore, your conversion rate goes up and Domain X outperforms Domain Y. So for people and for search engines, this viral-focused content in the right scenario can be a wonderful investment and a wise one to make to serve your SEO strategy.

All right, everyone. Look forward to your comments below. We'll see you again next week for another edition of Whiteboard Friday. Take care.

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

]]>https://www.jumpartmedia.com/how-the-internet-of-things-iot-is-changing-customer-relationships-video/feed/010 WordPress Plugins Using Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learninghttps://www.jumpartmedia.com/10-wordpress-plugins-using-artificial-intelligence-and-machine-learning/
https://www.jumpartmedia.com/10-wordpress-plugins-using-artificial-intelligence-and-machine-learning/#respondFri, 16 Mar 2018 09:27:55 +0000https://www.jumpartmedia.com/10-wordpress-plugins-using-artificial-intelligence-and-machine-learning/Do you want to use artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies on your WordPress site? There is a chance that you might already be using one. In this article, we will share some WordPress plugins that are using artificial intelligence and machine learning to offer smarter features for your website.

What is Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning? If you follow the news, then you must have heard the words artificial intelligence or machine learning being mentioned.
Artificial intelligence and machine learning are computer technologies that are used to offer smarter solutions in computer devices, apps, GPS devices, smart TVs, home assistance devices, and more.
Artificial intelligence gives computer programs ability to make choices without human intelligence.
Machine learning helps the software learn from experiences, data, and user activity to improve artificial intelligence and make better choices.
These technologies allow developers to automate tasks that w..

]]>Do you want to use artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies on your WordPress site? There is a chance that you might already be using one. In this article, we will share some WordPress plugins that are using artificial intelligence and machine learning to offer smarter features for your website.

What is Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning?

If you follow the news, then you must have heard the words artificial intelligence or machine learning being mentioned.

Artificial intelligence and machine learning are computer technologies that are used to offer smarter solutions in computer devices, apps, GPS devices, smart TVs, home assistance devices, and more.

Machine learning helps the software learn from experiences, data, and user activity to improve artificial intelligence and make better choices.

These technologies allow developers to automate tasks that would normally need human intelligence.

For example, voice recognition, search patterns, translations, image recognition, and more are currently being used by most modern mobile phones and smart devices.

What’s the difference between artificial intelligence and machine learning?

Artificial intelligence can make decisions based on programmed intelligence.

Machine learning further enhances artificial intelligence by self-learning through user activity and collecting information. This makes artificial intelligence smarter and allows it to make more accurate decisions.

What about machines taking over the world?

Many prominent scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs have expressed their concern over the possible threat to human society from artificial intelligence and self learning machines.

However, it also has great potential to improve lives for billions of people. That’s why even the most prominent AI skeptics encourage its careful usage for the greater good.

What Artificial Intelligence Can do For WordPress Websites?

It can provide smarter and much better user experience to your users. For example, it can improve WordPress search, grammar and style checking, show related content, improve conversions, boost ecommerce sales, and more.

Your website becomes smarter, faster, and more personalized for your users. This saves you time which allows you to do other things to grow your business.

That being said, let’s take a look at the WordPress plugins that are using AI and machine learning.

1. Akismet

Akismet is one of the only two plugins that come pre-installed on every WordPress website. It uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to detect spam comments.

Used by millions of website, Akismet has improved over the years to detect almost all spam submitted by bots. It can also detect spam comments manually submitted by actual human users by learning from its mistakes and recognizing patterns across millions of websites.

For more details see our Akismet guide for beginners with instructions on how to set it up on your WordPress website.

2. WordLift

WordLift integrates their web based service to your WordPress website. It offers SEO tips to improve your content with the help of their knowledge graph.

It analyzes your content to offer facts, figures, and media to match and build contextual relationships among your articles which results in better content recommendations. It builds a knowledge graph for your own website which becomes smarter as you add more content to your website.

3. After The Deadline

After The Deadline was previously available as a standalone WordPress plugin, but it is now available as part of the JetPack plugin suite. It is an artificial intelligence powered grammar checking tool that analyzes the readability of your content to help you write better.

It supports American, British, and Canadian English with limited grammar support for French and German languages. It is also available as a Google Chrome addon as an alternative to the JetPack module.

4. Google Language Translator

If you want your users to easily translate your website content, without actually creating a multilingual WordPress site, then Google Language Translator is the easiest way to do this. It brings Google’s AI and machine learning translation engine to your WordPress website.

You can simply select languages you want to display on your website. After that, you can add the translator to your website using the sidebar widget or shortcode.

For detailed instructions, see our guide on how to add Google Translate in WordPress.

5. MyCurator Content Curation

MyCurator is a cloud based content curation service. It allows you to add artificial intelligence powered content aggregator, which shows content relevant to your selected topics and improves results by learning from what you add or vote on.

You can create a curated content section on your website by fetching the best bits of content relevant to your audience. You can add any article you like to your website with an excerpt and a link back to original source.

Upon activation, the plugin adds a WatsonFinds icon to your WordPress post editor. Clicking on it will bring up a popup with your content’s emotional score. Based on the words you choose and the overall context of the data, the plugin will show you insights into how your content may feel to your human readers.

7. Quttera Web Malware Scanner

Quttera Web Malware Scanner allows you to scan your WordPress site for malware and malicious code. This is particularly useful if you suspect that your WordPress site is hacked or blacklisted from search engines.

The plugin uses artificial intelligence to learn from false positives and improves scan results based on usage. While it is helpful in scanning an infected website, it doesn’t protect your website from getting affected.

8. Live Chat – 24/7

Live Chat 24-7 provides AI powered virtual chat agent for your website. If you cannot afford to add live chat support to your website, then this bot can perform basic tasks of pointing your users in the right direction.

You will need to sign up for a free account on plugin’s website. After that it will start learning as you use it. You can also train it what to say and how to response to user queries. This can be handy in keeping users engaged on your website and generate more leads.

9. Related Posts for WordPress by Bibblio

As the name suggests, Related Posts for WordPress by Bibblio is a WordPress related posts plugin powered by Artificial Intelligence. It learns from user activity on your website to improve related posts displayed across your website. You can display related posts below the content, in sidebar, or using the shortcode.

It is free to use for up to 500 pages. If you have more content, then you will need a monthly plan. You will also have to create a free account to use the plugin.

10. Recomendo

Recomendo is another artificial intelligence powered recommendation engine with machine-learning capabilities. It can display related content anywhere on your website. The recommendations get better based on how your users interact with them.

It is compatible with mulitlingual websites using WPML and online stores using WooCommerce which means it can show related products to users based on what they have already seen on your site.

We hope this article helped you learn about WordPress plugins using artificial intelligence and machine learning. You may also want to see our guide on how to improve your WordPress website speed and performance.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post 10 WordPress Plugins Using Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning appeared first on WPBeginner.

]]>https://www.jumpartmedia.com/10-wordpress-plugins-using-artificial-intelligence-and-machine-learning/feed/0Zero-Result SERPs: Welcome to the Future We Should’ve Known Was Cominghttps://www.jumpartmedia.com/zero-result-serps-welcome-to-the-future-we-shouldve-known-was-coming/
https://www.jumpartmedia.com/zero-result-serps-welcome-to-the-future-we-shouldve-known-was-coming/#respondFri, 16 Mar 2018 01:05:25 +0000https://www.jumpartmedia.com/zero-result-serps-welcome-to-the-future-we-shouldve-known-was-coming/Posted by Dr-Pete
On Wednesday, Google launched a large-scale experiment, removing organic results from a small set of searches with definitive answers such as this one for "What time is it in Seattle?":

These SERPs display a Knowledge Card with a "Show all results" button and no additional organic results or SERP features. Danny Sullivan wrote on Twitter that this is currently limited to a small set of answers, including calculators, unit conversions, and some time/date queries. Here's another one, converting yesterday's MozCast temperature ("108 degrees in celsius"):

At first glance, this is a startling development, but it shouldn't be entirely surprising. So, let's get to the hard questions — is this a sign of things to come, and how quickly do we need to adapt?
For today, don't panicFirst off, preliminary data suggests that these really are isolated cases. Across the 10,000 searches that MozCast tracks daily, one search (0.01%) currently displays zero ..

On Wednesday, Google launched a large-scale experiment, removing organic results from a small set of searches with definitive answers such as this one for "What time is it in Seattle?":

These SERPs display a Knowledge Card with a "Show all results" button and no additional organic results or SERP features. Danny Sullivan wrote on Twitter that this is currently limited to a small set of answers, including calculators, unit conversions, and some time/date queries. Here's another one, converting yesterday's MozCast temperature ("108 degrees in celsius"):

At first glance, this is a startling development, but it shouldn't be entirely surprising. So, let's get to the hard questions — is this a sign of things to come, and how quickly do we need to adapt?

For today, don't panic

First off, preliminary data suggests that these really are isolated cases. Across the 10,000 searches that MozCast tracks daily, one search (0.01%) currently displays zero results: "1 gigabit to gigabyte." This change is not impacting most high-volume, competitive queries or even the vast majority of results with Knowledge Cards.

Second, we have to face the reality that Knowledge Cards, even paired with organic results, already dramatically impact search user behavior. Thanks to Russ Jones, we've pulled some data from an internal CTR study we're currently working on at Moz. In that study, SERPs with 10 blue links have a roughly 79% organic click-through rate (overall). Add just a Knowledge Card, with no other features, and that drops to 25%. That's a 68% drop-off, a loss of over two-thirds of organic clicks. Google has tested this change and likely found that showing organic links on these particular searches provided very little additional value.

This isn't new (part 1)

I'm going to argue that this change is one that we in the industry should've seen coming, and I'm going to do it in two parts. First, we know that Knowledge Cards and other answers (including Featured Snippets) power SERPs on devices where screen size is at a minimum or non-existent.

Take for example, a search for "Where was Stephen Hawking born?" Even though the answer is definitive (there is one factual answer to this question), Google displays a rich Knowledge Card plus a full set of organic SERPs. On mobile, though, that Knowledge Card dominates results. Here's a full-screen image:

The Knowledge Card extends below the fold and dominates the mobile screen. This assumes I see the SERP at all. Even as I was typing the question, Google tried to give me the answer…

If the basic information is all I need, and if I trust Google as a source for that information, why would I need to even click at this point?

On mobile, I at least have the option to peruse organic results. On Google Home, if I ask the same question ("Where was Stephen Hawking born?"), I get no SERP at all, just the answer:

"Stephen Hawking was born in Oxford, United Kingdom."

Obviously, this is born of necessity on a voice-only device like Google Home, but we get a similarly truncated result with voice searches through Google Assistant. This is the same answer on my phone (the same phone as the previous screenshots), but using voice search instead of text search…

Google's push toward voice UI and mobile-first design means that these considerations sometimes move back up the chain of devices. If the answer is enough for voice and mobile, maybe it's enough for desktop.

This isn't new (part 2)

Over the past couple of years, I've talked a lot about how SERPs have expanded well beyond 10 blue links. What we talk about less is the flip-side, that SERPs are also shrinking. Adding SERP features is, in some cases, a zero-sum game, at the cost of organic results.

Each of the following features take up one organic position:

Full site-links (each row)

Image results

Top Stories

In-depth articles (3 articles = 1 organic)

Tweets (carousel)

Tweets (single)

Across the 10,000 SERPs in our data set, over half (51%) had less than 10 traditional organic results. While very-low counts are rare, over one-fourth of page-one SERPs fell into the range of 5–8 organic results.

While the zero-result SERP is certainly a new and extreme case, the removal of organic results in favor of other features has been happening (and expanding) for quite some time now. SERPs with as few as 3–4 page-one organic results have been appearing in the wild for well over a year.

In some cases, you might not even realize that a result isn't organic. Consider, for example, the following set of results on desktop. Can you spot the In-depth Articles?

On desktop results, there are no visual markers separating In-depth Articles from organic results, even though these results are powered by two different aspects of the algorithm. From the source code markers, we can see that the answer is #2–#5, three results which displace one organic result:

Another example is Twitter results. You've probably seen the Twitter carousel, which is a visually distinct format with three tweets, but have you seen a result like this one (on a search for "cranberry")?

At first glance, it looks organic (except for the Twitter icon), but this result is a vertical result pulled directly from the Twitter data feed. It is not subject to traditional organic optimization and ranking factors.

All of this is to say that organic real estate has been shrinking for quite a while, giving way to vertical results, Knowledge Graph results, and other rich features. Google will continue to experiment, and we can expect that some SERPs will continue to shrink. Where the data suggests that one answer is enough, we may only see one answer, at the cost of organic results.

Search intent vs. opportunity

It's easy to let our imaginations run wild, but we have to consider intent. The vast majority of searches are never going to have one definitive answer, and some queries aren't even questions, in the traditional sense.

From an SEO and content standpoint, I think we have to expand our idea of informational search intent (vs. transactional or navigational, using the classic model). Some questions are factual, and can be answered by the ever-expanding Knowledge Graph. As of today, a search like "When is Pi Day?" still shows organic results, but the Knowledge Card gives us a definitive answer…

Here, organic opportunity is very limited. Think of this as a "closed informational" search.

On the other hand, open-ended questions still rely very much on a variety of answers, even when Google tries to choose one of those answers. Consider the search "What is the best pie?", which returns the following Featured Snippet (a hybrid of organic result and answer box)…

No one answer will ever suffice for this question. Even the author of this post had the decency to say "Go ahead and let me have it in the comments," knowing the disagreement would soon flow like cherry filling.

Think of these searches as "open informational" searches. Even if we have to compete for the Featured Snippet (especially on voice results), there will be organic/SEO opportunity here for the foreseeable future.

Ultimately, we have to adapt, and we have to get smarter about the searchers we target. Where Google can answer a question, they will try to answer that question, and if organic results add no measurable value (regardless of whether you agree with how Google measures value), they will continue to shrink.

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

]]>https://www.jumpartmedia.com/zero-result-serps-welcome-to-the-future-we-shouldve-known-was-coming/feed/0This Is How You Tell a Story (and Other Things SXSW Taught Me)https://www.jumpartmedia.com/this-is-how-you-tell-a-story-and-other-things-sxsw-taught-me/
https://www.jumpartmedia.com/this-is-how-you-tell-a-story-and-other-things-sxsw-taught-me/#respondFri, 16 Mar 2018 01:05:18 +0000https://www.jumpartmedia.com/this-is-how-you-tell-a-story-and-other-things-sxsw-taught-me/I write a lot about creating an experience.
About humanizing. About authenticity. About telling a story. About being helpful.
In a marketing context, much of this boils down to the idea of your brand: about who you are, what you can do, and how that shapes the messages you send your audience -- and how you send them.
I closely align all of those things with the idea of a story. A brand story, perhaps.
But what I've learned at SXSW is: your story is as much about what you aren't as it is what you are, especially when you're creating an experience for your audience.
Here's how I came to that conclusion -- and what I learned about how to tell a story.
What SXSW Taught Me About Storytelling and More Brand Activation At SXSW, there's been a great deal of buzz around the term "brand activation," which branding firm Cramer defines as "any campaign, event, or experience that enables your brand to engage directly with consumers and build a loyal brand community ar..

About humanizing. About authenticity. About telling a story. About being helpful.

In a marketing context, much of this boils down to the idea of your brand: about who you are, what you can do, and how that shapes the messages you send your audience — and how you send them.

I closely align all of those things with the idea of a story. A brand story, perhaps.

But what I've learned at SXSW is: your story is as much about what you aren't as it is what you are, especially when you're creating an experience for your audience.

Here's how I came to that conclusion — and what I learned about how to tell a story.

What SXSW Taught Me About Storytelling and More

Brand Activation

At SXSW, there's been a great deal of buzz around the term "brand activation," which branding firm Cramer defines as "any campaign, event, or experience that enables your brand to engage directly with consumers and build a loyal brand community around your product or service."

And at SXSW, these types of experiences are everywhere — whether it's from YouTube, Mercedes-Benz, Google, or an app for meditation (in this case, Headspace).

YouTube

Each one of these experiences centered around a single phrase or keyword. YouTube's, for instance, was the concept of stories — classic ones, like fairy tales, that were retold in its big red "house" (the "YouTube Story HQ") by way of digital videos the audience could interact with.

When users first arrived at the house, they were asked to blow into a microphone. Why? Because they were being inserted into the role of the big bad wolf from the story of "The Three Little Pigs" — and by blowing into the microphone, they would see by way of a video broadcasted on a screen above it what would happen to that little pig's house.

(Full disclosure: I didn't actually know what I was doing at the time and felt terrible for blowing down the pig's house, even if it was just a fictional video.)

But here's the thing: at the core of YouTube's brand is video, whether we use the platform to view it, create it, or share it.

And by participating in this experience — I was activating the brand.

What isn't necessarily central to the YouTube story, however, is the concept of fairytales — especially in the context of recent scrutiny its received for some of the content shared on the platform and how the company is handling it.

When the average online consumer thinks of "YouTube," I would predict the first associations that come to mind aren't the tales of Rapunzel, Little Red Riding Hood, or The Three Little Pigs. Personally, I think of makeup tutorials, hours-long videos of relaxing music that I leave on for my dog while I'm at work, and "Saturday Night Live" skits I missed.

But fairytales? Not so much.

Which is what makes what YouTube did at SXSW so brilliant. It took something not associated with its brand and used what it's known for to re-tell these classics in the best way the brand knows how: by way of video.

This experience was as much about what YouTube isn't as it was about what YouTube is. At the center of their SXSW story was, well, stories — and re-framing them in a way that aligned with the brand.

Mercedes-Benz

The keyword for this story was "smart."

One of the first sessions I attended at SXSW was a talk given by Wilko Stark, VP of Mercedes-Benz Cars Strategy, on little-known facts about self-driving cars.

What underscored his points was the idea of automobiles as intelligent machines — cars that are smart enough to take care of themselves and navigate their surroundings in a way that allows passengers to carry out their day-to-day lives during the ride.

And that's a key component of this story: not just the smart factor, but how it helps the audience.

It reminded me of something Facebook Product Design Manager Tutti Taygerly said at a different panel: "Anchor on the core people problem, and then figure out, 'What is the work?' 'What are the use cases?'"

Mercedes-Benz had quite a widespread presence throughout SXSW that went far beyond this talk. In fact, the brand took over a park in Austin to create an entire multi-installment experience based on the foundation of "smart," in the form of cars, homes (in this case, a "Kasita"), and more.

But wait — Mercedes-Benz doesn't make homes. At the core of its brand is cars: high-end, luxury, and often cost-prohibitive cars. So what place did the idea of smart homes have in this experience?

The "smart" part. Mercedes-Benz is building the concept of intelligence into its brand, whether it's by way of autonomous technology or vehicular efficiency, the latter of which was made apparent in this somewhat compact but well-equipped car that I got to take for a make-believe spin:

Plus, it was a really cool thing for the audience to see at an experience under the Mercedes-Benz name. So, while this particular brand doesn't build houses — it can build an overall smart experience. And to do that, it partnered with another brand — Kasita — to help.

Headspace

Headspace is an app that provides users with guided meditations, mantras, and other calm-inducing experiences. It's something you find on your phone and experience virtually.

But at SXSW, Headspace brought that experience to life with its "Room to Breathe."

It's not always easy to bring something like a mobile app to life in a tangible, hands-on way, especially when that app is what Wiredonce called "incredibly ironic": a digital service that's meant to give us space from, well, our often over-connected digital lives.

Here, it made sense. For all the benefits of SXSW, it could also be described as overwhelming: a constant sea of music, film, panels, and brand activations.

But here, the brand was activated when attendees stepped away from the chaos and into a room with space to breathe.

There wasn't anything particularly fancy about it. The room was small, and there were no big, shiny installations, with the minor exception of a projection screen that displayed guided mindfulness exercises.

Instead, there were small stations with mobile devices and headphones where users could read about different meditation exercises offered by the app and choose the one that fit their schedules.

And that's exactly what the app itself provides: only here, it took place in person in a nicely-decorated room that also hosted daily guided meditation sessions by a human, not a recorded voice on a device.

The moral of this story, I thought, was "pause" — which was reflected in the simplicity of the story the experience told.

The question I pose now is this: What's your story?

In answering that, remember stories have more than one character. And while they have protagonists, that central character is supported by others.

The same is true of brands. Your story is about who and what you are — the protagonist — as much as what you aren't.

And when it makes sense to include what you're not in your story, that's where your supporting characters come in. Sometimes, that's a co-brand, or something that's not in your primary offering but fits into your story and tells it in a way that creates a better experience for the user.

]]>https://www.jumpartmedia.com/this-is-how-you-tell-a-story-and-other-things-sxsw-taught-me/feed/0How to Restore the Get Shortlink Button in WordPresshttps://www.jumpartmedia.com/how-to-restore-the-get-shortlink-button-in-wordpress/
https://www.jumpartmedia.com/how-to-restore-the-get-shortlink-button-in-wordpress/#respondThu, 15 Mar 2018 11:53:15 +0000https://www.jumpartmedia.com/how-to-restore-the-get-shortlink-button-in-wordpress/Do you want to create a shortlink of your WordPress blog posts or pages? WordPress shortlinks are useful for sharing in your emails, facebook messages, or even text messages. It was a default feature until WordPress version 4.4. Recently, one of our readers asked how to bring back the get shortlink feature in WordPress. In this tutorial, we will share how to restore the get shortlink button in WordPress.

What is the Get Shortlink Button in WordPress? Get Shortlink button is a WordPress feature that allows you to easily get a short link of your WordPress blog post or page. It used to be located right next to the permalink area in the post edit screen.

However if you recently started your blog, then you will not see this feature on your WordPress site because it was removed after WordPress version 4.4.
We find this feature to be quite useful for easily getting shortlinks for our blog posts that look like this:
http://wpbeg.in/2csN1pj
If you want to bring back the get shortlink fe..

]]>Do you want to create a shortlink of your WordPress blog posts or pages? WordPress shortlinks are useful for sharing in your emails, facebook messages, or even text messages. It was a default feature until WordPress version 4.4. Recently, one of our readers asked how to bring back the get shortlink feature in WordPress. In this tutorial, we will share how to restore the get shortlink button in WordPress.

What is the Get Shortlink Button in WordPress?

Get Shortlink button is a WordPress feature that allows you to easily get a short link of your WordPress blog post or page. It used to be located right next to the permalink area in the post edit screen.

However if you recently started your blog, then you will not see this feature on your WordPress site because it was removed after WordPress version 4.4.

We find this feature to be quite useful for easily getting shortlinks for our blog posts that look like this:

http://wpbeg.in/2csN1pj

If you want to bring back the get shortlink feature on your WordPress site, then you’re in the right place.

Let’s take a look at how to bring back the get shortlink button back in WordPress.

Method 1: Using WP Bitly plugin to Add Get Shortlink Button

This method is easier and recommended for most users. This method also allows you to create custom branded short URLs for your website.

First thing you need to do is install and activate the WP Bitly plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a plugin in WordPress.

Upon activation, this plugin will automatically add the Get Shortlink button on your post edit screen.

Once you click on this button, it will show you the shortlink for your WordPress posts and pages. This shortlink can be shared in your emails and messages, so your audience can reach directly to the page.

You can also use the WP Bitly plugin to create custom branded shortlinks for your blog posts like we do on WPBeginner. See our step by step guide on how to create your own customized short url in WordPress.

Method 2: Manually Adding Get Shortlink Button

This method requires you to add code to your WordPress files. If you haven’t done this before, then please take a look at our guide on how to copy and paste code in WordPress.

You will need to add the following code to your WordPress theme’s functions.php file or a site-specific plugin: